Death is not an unfamiliar visitor to Shady Oaks Retirement Village, which provides San Diego with premier elderly support from independent retiree housing to full-time hospice care. But when a resident's body is found brutally stabbed and his apartment ransacked, it's clear there's someone deadly in their community. Detective Katherine "Kit" McKittrick quickly discovers that Shady Oaks is full of skeleton-riddled closets, and most tenants prefer to keep their doors firmly closed to the SDPD.

A longtime volunteer at the retirement facility, Dr. Sam Reeves honors his late grandfather's memory by playing the piano for the residents regularly. So it shouldn't be such a surprise when Kit crosses paths with him during her investigation, after she'd avoided the criminal psychologist--and the emotions he evokes--for the last six months.

Sam's rapport within the retirement village proves vital to the case, and the pair find themselves working together once again--much to Kit's dismay. But she is determined to apprehend the shadow of death lurking around Shady Oaks...and equally determined to ignore the feelings she's developing for a certain psychologist.